You’re tired, sunburnt, dehydrated, hungry, feeling scammed and you might have paid up to $300 or more for all of that. Why? Because the convention or music festival you bought tickets to has brutally failed its attendees.
Conventions and festivals have been put on for decades, with one of the most recognizable being Woodstock. But most people can likely name one that failed in one way or another, including Woodstock ’99, whose destruction even earned itself a Netflix documentary. Festivals have a bit more history than conventions, which mainly bloomed with the birth of the internet. They gave people the opportunity to meet in-person with the fellow fans they had been talking to online, and possibly even meet some of their favorite online personalities. But, I’d argue that even more of those have failed than music festivals. So, why is this failure so prevalent?
I began to ponder that question after watching a two-hour Youtube essay by “StrangeAeons” on the history of “Dashcon,” the 2014 attempt at a convention for Tumblr.com users. Those familiar with its failure may know of the infamous image of the small ball pit, sitting sadly in the center of a large, near-empty room. If you have the chance, I highly recommend giving it a watch, even if it’s just on in the background; the creator put massive amounts of effort into it, holding 50+ interviews with staff and attendees in order to get an accurate retelling.
With Dashcon’s history fresh in my mind, I began to remember other failed conventions, Tana Mongeau’s “TanaCon” and “Fyre Festival” most notably. Fun fact: Billy McFarland, the creator of “Fyre Festival,” went to Bucknell before dropping out without completing his freshman year. When looking at all these conventions and festivals, none of them failed for the same reason, so let’s break down what causes these failures.
Crowds, or the lack thereof: “TanaCon’s” failure was mainly rooted in overselling tickets, which is what led to the greater issue of sunburnt and dehydrated attendees waiting outside. The venue simply wasn’t big enough, whereas part of Dashcon’s failure was caused by quite the opposite. “DashCon” tickets were to be bought in person, but the estimated attendance was based entirely on online interest—two very different things. Some of the interviewees noted how it was quite the nice venue for a first-time convention with so few attendees; it was clearly a hotel more accustomed to large-scale business conventions. With that average clientele, you can imagine how the staff took to a bunch of teenage cosplayers running around their hotel…
Poor planning and organization: It seems that some people are under the impression that they can just throw together a convention with zero experience, which is quite the lofty goal. No matter how much money you have, people you hire or tickets you sell, you’ve still never done this before. There’s no telling how a first-time event will play out. And yes, there is indeed a first time for everything. The streaming-centered convention “TwitchCon” was held for the first time in 2015, around the same time as “DashCon,” but it was organized by the sizable corporation “Twitch Interactive.” “DashCon,” on the other hand, was merely some Tumblr users who put their heads together and gave it their best shot—and boy, did it show.
Scams: The unfortunate reality is that sometimes, people just want money, and lots of it. And when you advertise a luxury festival in the Bahamas like Billy McFarland did, it’s quite easy to get that money. He was even able to get celebrity endorsements, which makes it legit, right? But “Fyre Festival” ended up being anything but that, leaving attendees wondering, “I paid all that money for this?”
Extenuating circumstances: Sometimes, the world is just not on your side, or on the side of the event either. There’s no telling if an outdoor festival is going to end up overshadowed by a torrential downpour, or suffer sweltering temperatures like Woodstock ’99. Then there’s any event planner’s worst nightmare: a performer cancels, and at worst, it’s the one everyone was waiting for. Even more out of anyone’s control is your attendees. You can’t predict what kind of people will attend, and you can’t control that either. They might make a mess, they might start fights and so on. And as they say, sometimes one person ruins it for everyone.
All in all, there are plenty of widely successful music festivals and conventions to outnumber the few bad apples. They’re often amazing events where people really get their money’s worth, and get to meet tons of people with the same interests as them. But the next time your favorite content creator or a new company tries to put on an event… maybe steer clear of the first run. I’m sure “DashCon 2” and “Fyre Festival 2025” will be better, right?
